Hocus Pocus
by psycho pixie
Summary: YGOHP crossover... het and yaoi abound, be warned, lol. When Voldemort starts meddling with the Shadow Realm, and Harry picks up on it through their connection, he goes to Dumbledore, who has some interesting solutions. So, so totally cliche. But... fu


**Summary**: No, Voldemort doesn't want to possess the power of the Millennium Items… but he _is _curious. Why? Because a certain Tom Riddle just won't leave him alone, that's why. And when Harry picks up on this conflict through his own bond with Voldemort, Dumbledore does what any wise man would do…

He calls Shaadi.

**Pairings**: Yami/Yugi, Kaiba/Set, Ginny/Tom, Ron/Hermione, and I don't think I'll be pairing Harry. If I do, the pairing will be a surprise to me, too, lol. I'm a dub-girl, so pretty much the only Japanese _anything_ that shows up will be _aibou_. Sorry 'bout that… I'm weaned on the WB. My God, I'm 20 and I admit this freely.

……………._Chapter 1_

Seto Kaiba stared at the object that lay on his desk. "Get. That thing. _Out_ of my office."

Yami folded his arms. "I can't do that, Kaiba. You're the only one who can truly control the Rod, and if you don't have it, then it could fall into the wrong hands again."

"Hands like Malik's," Mokuba agreed. "You saw what happened when he controlled it…"

"And yet we're all still here. Get out of my office, and take that _thing _with you," he ordered, turning back to his computer. "Mokuba, I don't want to hear another word about this from you, and if I find out you've cut detention _again_ so that you can hang around with his bunch of losers, I'll ground you until you've forgotten what sunlight looks like."

His brother stood his ground, wise beyond his thirteen years. "I can't do that, big brother. You're too stubborn for your own good sometimes, you know?"

"Irrelevant," was the reply. "You may buy into their hocus-pocus, Mokuba, but _I _don't. I can only hear the words _destiny_ and _fate _so many times before I quit caring. And _heart of the cards_, while we're at it. But the point is, I don't have time for problems that Yugi and his friends come up with. I have _important _things to deal with, and his Egyptian daydreams don't exactly show up on my schedule. On that note." _Don't let the door hit you on your way out_ was silently and clearly attached to the end of his statement as he focused on his computer. "I've wasted enough of my time on this nonsense already," he added. "That was ten valuable minutes of my time that you've used up, Mutou, so get out before I decide to charge you for it."

Yami stood, not bothering to remind Kaiba that he wasn't exactly Yugi, as he recognized a lost cause when he saw one, and turned away. "I'll go, Kaiba, but I'm leaving the Rod behind. It won't take kindly to being removed from your presence, I'd imagine, and I don't want its wrath aimed at me right now."

"Then at least get it the hell off my desk," was the distracted reply. "It's _tacky_."

Yami resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "_You _move it, Kaiba. I'm hardly your maid."

"I'll show you out," Mokuba offered, shooting a dark glance at his older brother, who chose to ignore their guest and the offending object on his desk. "C'mon, Pharaoh."

That elicited a snort from Kaiba, but now he was ignored.

They stepped out into the hallway and headed to the elevator, where Yugi was waiting. "Well? How did it go?"

His darker half gave him a Look. "You shouldn't have to ask, aibou."

"I know, but I figured after the mess in there, you'd want to complain about it."

"He's just… not ready to deal with what all this means," Mokuba sighed. "You know how my brother gets. He's had his soul trapped in a card, played in duels where his soul would have been banished if he lost, stuff like that, but he just doesn't know what it really means. I keep worrying that one day, his denial will get him hurt, but he just won't listen to me."

"It's okay, Mokuba. Now that the Rod is with him, I doubt he'll be parted from it," Yami assured him. "The magic that the Rod possesses will protect him at all costs, whether he likes it or not."

As he and Yugi stepped onto the elevator, Mokuba waved a farewell. "Here's to hoping, right?" he said with a weak smile. "Big brother will come around… but it'll take him awhile."

"Let us know if anything happens," Yugi said around the closing doors.

Once they were alone, they exchanged glances.

"How will Mokuba know if anything happens?" Yugi wondered.

"He won't have to. _We'll _know. If Kaiba so much as _touches _the Rod, trust me. You and I, if not anyone else, will know the moment he touches it. Unfortunately."

"That bad, huh?" Yugi said finally.

"I wish I could take that godforsaken thing and drop it to the bottom of the ocean," his darkness growled. "I don't like this, aibou. Not even a little bit."

"But… Kaiba having the Rod is a step in the right direction, isn't it?" Yugi offered. "I mean, if he's got it, then it can't be used for evil, right?"

"If only it were that simple," he sighed.

"Stop being vague, Yami. It doesn't help at all."

"I'm not sure that the Rod is safe from evil, aibou. The Millennium Rod isn't like the Eye, or the Necklace. It's an item like the Ring, and the Puzzle. There's a soul trapped in it."

Silence hung.

"Oh, that's great. That's just _fantastic_. The High Priest, right?"

"Exactly. The High Priest that I apparently trapped there when he tried to overthrow me and take the power of my Puzzle. His spirit has lost none of it potency – I lost my memories and most of my power by sealing our three souls away, but he and the tomb robber lost nothing. It's bad enough with Bakura, whose Shadow powers are weak in comparison… Set wasn't my High Priest for nothing. His magic was something that even I had the common sense to fear, and it was only because of my faith in my monsters that I was able to defeat him. Kaiba, in both of his lives, has failed to truly grasp the fact that you must completely trust in your cards to win. If you rely only on yourself, you will lose. In that final battle, he relied only upon himself and he lost his soul."

"So that must be one of the memories that you…"

"Only parts of it. I don't remember how, and I don't know why I sealed myself away at such a cost. I only know that I must have had a very good reason."

Yugi nodded. "I see the battle with Kaiba in our dreams, sometimes."

"He's so much like Set sometimes that I used to wonder if perhaps his soul escaped and merged theirs together," Yami admitted.

"So… why give Kaiba the Rod, if the spirit in it is so powerful?"

Crimson eyes grew distant. "I'm not sure. I know only that it _cannot _fall into the hands of another. There's someone… I don't know who, and I don't know where, but this person seeks access to the Shadow Realm. They don't have a Millennium Item, however, and I want it to stay that way. For better or worse, the Rod belongs to Seto Kaiba, and now that he has it, it won't allow someone else to take it. All I know is that the shadows have been stirring and deepening, and I don't like it. I wish I knew more… but I don't."

His Light squeezed his hand. "I'm sure nothing will come of it. I haven't felt anything, and Ryou hasn't mentioned anything – it might just be Bakura, you know?"

"The next time you see him, ask if Bakura has been up to anything," Yami suggested. "You're right – it might be nothing. But it never hurt to double-check."

……..

**Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry  
Not much later**

Harry rubbed his scar for the umpteenth time that night, having given up on sleep as nightmares stalked him and left him more tired than when he'd gone to sleep. Most of the time he dreamt of Sirius, or of Bellatrix Lestrange and the mad gleam in her eyes as Sirius fell through the Veil, but some nights he dreamt of _him_.

Sometimes he dreamt of a dark place, filled with shadows that hid more shadows, a place where he was surrounded by darkness, a place filled with things he couldn't even imagine. But everything seemed to be hidden by shadows…

Tonight, for example.

The dreams had grown steadily worse lately – now the screams in Harry's mind sounded like Voldemort's, mixed in with that shrill laughter, all at the same time. He stared into the darkness silently, wishing it would stop, wishing he'd wake up and realize it was all a bad dream. Maybe when he woke up, it'd be the middle of his fifth year – maybe it would even be fourth year, before Cedric died. Maybe Cedric and Sirius were all just part of some nightmare that would never end, and in reality Voldemort hadn't come back. Maybe he'd wake up and realize that the Second Task was only a day away.

If only, though.

He couldn't shake the confined feeling from his dreams. That feeling of being bound, of being… _trapped_. Trapped behind a wall in his own mind, forced to watch the world pass by as though it were just a movie. He shivered – he _hated_ being boxed in. It reminded him of living under the stairs with the Dursleys, back before he knew that there was an entire world waiting for him, one that wouldn't lock him in a cupboard with spiders and rats when he was bad.

His scar throbbed again, but not as badly this time. If it would just stop _hurting_, he was tired enough to fall asleep and wake up in time for winter break.

If it would just stop.

**Kaiba Corporation  
Same day**

Seto Kaiba could no longer pretend like the hideous thing on his desk wasn't really there. For the past three _hours_ he'd kept his back to it, occasionally shoving it away from him with the edge of a folder or something. Just as long as he didn't _touch _it.

Especially since his hand itched to wrap around the cool gold shaft, because he knew – he just _knew_ that if he touched it, his whole body would tingle with power, and that would make Yugi _right _about all his ancient-Egypt nonsense

And he simply couldn't allow that.

So he ignored it.

Or… pretended to.

Until he thought. He would go. _Insane._

Finally, he could focus on work no more. Stocks and interests and such things could no longer hold his attention, and he found himself just… sitting. Staring at it with a mix of curiosity and suspicion, like it might bite him.

_I ought to just throw it away,_ he thought calmly. _Once it's in the trash can, it's not my problem anymore. It's just garbage. I can't be held responsible for what happens once it's in the garbage._

With the edge of a folder, he pushed it across his desk, and it fell neatly into the wastebasket at his feet, out of sight and out of mind.

Sort of.

He turned back to his work, but all he could do was stare at the screen. The words and letters before him could very well have been French for all he could comprehend, so distracted was he. And all because of that stupid _stick_.

He glared at the wastebasket through his desk, willing it to catch on fire. When nothing happened, he scowled and turned away again, but was still completely unable to focus.

_It's just because Yugi made such an ordeal out of it,_ he decided. _I just need to get it out of my office. I'll take it to one of my secretaries and have her… pawn it. Sell it. Give it away. She could _steal _it, for all I care. It just needs to go _away

The prospect of that thing being someone else's possession tickled his brain, and so far it seemed like the _only _good idea he'd had all day long. He pressed a button on his phone. "Alice."

"Angie, sir."

"Whatever. I'm bringing an ugly gold… _stick_… out to you. I want you to get rid of it; I don't care how. If I see it in this building again, you're fired. Get it as far away from me as you can."

He didn't wait for her to answer before disconnecting. With renewed purpose, he stood and reached into the little garbage can, grabbing the Millennium Rod and…

…Falling to his knees upon touching it.

_What's... going on?_ he finally managed to piece together.

It was in those critical moments, as Kaiba realized he had _no _control over his own body, that he decided he was losing it. Because he was hearing a voice. In his head.

'Well. It's about damned _time_, you stubborn fool.'

…….TBC!

_Like it? Hate it? Think I'm stupid for posting it? _Tell _me, for goodness sake! I live for your feedback. And how do you get the back-slashes for yami-hikari conversation? keeps deleting mine as if they're typos or something._


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